Nomsu’s Syntax

Nomsu’s syntax has a few basic structures. Most of them have an inline form, and an indented form, which can be used when something is to big to fit on one line. For consistency, Nomsu requires all indentation to be exactly 4 spaces.

Numbers

Nomsu’s number literals are very standard: 5, 2.3, 0x2A. Since Nomsu runs on the Lua virtual machine, ‘number’ is a single type–integers and floating point numbers both have the same type.

Variables

Nomsu variables have a “$” prefix: $x. Optionally, if you want to use a space in your variable’s name, you can surround the variable name in parentheses: $(my list). Variable names are not limited by typical programming language constraints. You can have nameless variables: $, number variables: $2 or $4th, and unicode variables: $徳川家康.

Dictionaries

Nomsu dictionaries (also known as hash maps, or hash tables) are surrounded by curly braces, and each key has a “.” in front of it: {.x=1, ."my string"=5, .99="foo"}. Dictionary keys and values may have any type (.x is a shorthand for ."x"). Values in the dictionary are accessed with the “.” operator: $dict.x, $dict."my string", $dict.99. Multi-line dictionaries start with a “{”, have an indented list of comma- or newline-separated entries, and end with a “}”:

$dict = {
    .x = 1, .y = 2
    ."my string key" = 3
    .(1 + 2) = "okay"
}

Trailing commas are allowed.

Lists

Nomsu lists are surrounded by square brackets: [1, 2, 3]. Lists are indexed in the same way as dictionaries (i.e. with the “.” operator), but it’s important to note that Nomsu lists are 1-indexed (because Nomsu runs on the Lua virual machine). This means that $things.1 accesses the first element in $things, $things.2 the second, and so on. #$things (as in “number of things”) can be used to get the length of a list. For Lua programmers, this should be familiar. For new programmers, this should be intuitive. For experienced programmers, this can be annoying at first, but don’t worry, the adaptation phase is short! Multi-line lists start with a “[”, have an indented list of comma- or newline-separated items, and end with a ”]”:

$things = [
    1, 2, 3
    4, 5
]

Again, trailing commas are allowed.

Text

Nomsu’s text is enclosed in double quotation marks: "hello". Special characters may be escaped with a backslash: "newline: \n, quote: \", control: \x1B", and the backslash may also be used to insert values: "the value of $x is \$x and 2 + 3 = \(2 + 3)". Long text can span multiple lines by starting with a (", then including the text in an indented region, then ending with a "):

$text = ("
    This is some text.
    It spans multiple lines.

    A really long line can be \
    ..broken up like that.

    Text interpolations still work: \$x
    and you can have multi-line
    interpolations like: \[
        $foo, "list value", 2, 3
    ]

        Leading spaces are allowed,
    | ← but only spaces that go past
        the base level of indentation.
")

Actions

A Nomsu action is a heavy-duty high-utility concept. The term “action” encompasses functions, macros, control flow, and operators. For now, let’s just think of them as functions. An action is a sequence of one or more words or expressions separated by spaces: say 55 (this calls the action say _ with the single argument 55). The words collectively make up the name of the action, and Nomsu does not require the name of the action to come before the arguments, so 55 squared (call _ squared with 55) is equally valid, as is take 55 and square it (call take _ and square it) or 5 plus 6 (call _ plus _ with 5 and 6). Actions can use a wide range of symbols and unicode characters, so their names can be symbolic like: √5 or 1 +/- 2. Nomsu does not have any reserved keywords, so any words are allowed in an action. However, defining an action with the exact same full name as a language structure like if _ _ else _ might cause problems. Actions may be defined using the _ means _ action:

(say how cool $person is) means:
    say "\$person is awesome!!"

say how cool "Joshua Norton" is

Optionally, you can also define an anonymous function literal as [$x, $y] -> ($x + $y).

Actions can be grouped with parentheses: say (5 squared), and for long lines, an indented region can be used:

perform a special calculation on
    the next prime after $x

Actions with only arguments and no words (like $my_fn 1 2 3) are treated as a function call, where the first value is the function and the rest are arguments (for no arguments, $my_fn()). Nomsu also supports a method call syntax, using a comma: $x, do thing with $y. This is equivalent to $x."do thing with" $x $y, i.e. calling $x’s “do thing with” function and passing $x as the first argument, along with all the extra arguments. This chains nicely, so you can have $x, as text, with "\n" -> " ".

Blocks

Blocks are a way to group multiple actions together, or to put actions into their own indented areas. A block is a colon followed by an indented region. The block ends when the indentation ends. In the above example, _ means _ is an action with two arguments, an action: (say how cool $person is) and a block that contains say "\$person is awesome!!" Nomsu’s basic control flow structures are just actions that use blocks:

if ($x == 10):
    say "$x was ten!"
    $x = 0

Here, the action if _ _ is given two arguments: ($x == 10) and a block with some more actions. If you need to add more action words or arguments after a block, just start the next line with ... This is how if-else works in Nomsu:

if ($x == 10):
    say "$x was ten!"
    $x = 0
..else:
    say "$x wasn't ten"